In the Media

Mashable reporter Emmet Smith spotlights how researchers from the MIT Media Matter Group have demonstrated how “silk can be harvested sustainably, using silkworms as active designers in the spinning of complex structures.”

A study co-authored by senior lecturer Richard Price explores the physics behind a spiraling football pass, reports Kenneth Chang for The New York Times. “I went on to apply some pretty simple mathematics and do what physicists do," says Price. “Which is to try and throw away all of the irrelevant details and get the heart of something.”

Researchers from MIT’s Task Force on the Work of the Future have released three new briefs that “explore the fragmented U.S. workforce training system for low- to moderate-skilled workers, as well as comparable programs in Europe,” writes Paul Fain for Inside Higher Ed. Fain notes that the briefs also examine “lessons from learning science and new technologies that could help make online education and workforce training more effective.”

Prof. Charles Stewart III speaks with Steve Inskeep of NPR about early voting in the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Stewart notes that, thus far, we’re seeing, “the sort of friction we get in a high-energy election on the first few days. Voters are eager to vote, and election officials are learning whether they have enough capacity at their early voting sites. And some places, it looks like they don't.”

MIT researchers have developed a solar-powered system that is able to extract drinkable water from dry air, reports Layal Liverpool for New Scientist. “In areas where water scarcity is a problem, it’s important to consider different technologies which provide water, particularly as climate change will exacerbate many water scarcity issues,” says graduate student Alina LaPotin.

Prof. Tonio Buonassisi writes for Indvstrvs about how businesses can use machine learning systems to help address some of the world’s most pressing challenges. “What has emerged through our research,” writes Buonassisi, “is a combination of automation, data science, and computation — building blocks that promise to accelerate the rate of new materials development tenfold, and eventually millions of times, faster.”

Institute Professor Emeritus Mario Molina, who former Vice President Al Gore called a “trailblazing pioneer of the climate movement,” has died at age 77, reports John Schwartz for The New York Times. Molina shared a “Nobel Prize for work showing the damage that chemicals used in hair spray and refrigerators wreak on the ozone layer, which led to one of the most successful international efforts to combat environmental risk.”

Robin Young of Here & Now spotlights a new documentary “Driving While Black.” Prof. Craig Steven Wilder explains that the term “driving while Black” is “not just part of our political rhetoric. It's not just something we say to remind ourselves of the persistence of racism in the United States. It's a very personal experience of remembering, in fact, the anxiety, the fear.”

Writing for Wired, Ash Carter, an innovation fellow at the MIT Innovation Initiative, spotlights a number of “technologists, activists, and policymakers who are thoughtfully creating and using technology in ways to protect the public good and help shape a better future.”

Paul Ha, director of the MIT List Visual Arts Center, is serving as one of the advisors to Simone Leigh, the first Black artist selected to represent the U.S. at the Venice Biennale, reports Andrea Shea for WBUR.

Writing for The Boston Globe, Prof. D. Fox Harrell, Francesca Panetta and Pakinam Amer of the MIT Center for Advanced Virtuality explore the potential dangers posed by deepfake videos. “Combatting misinformation in the media requires a shared commitment to human rights and dignity — a precondition for addressing many social ills, malevolent deepfakes included,” they write.

Guardian reporter Fiona Harvey memorializes the life and work of Institute Professor Emeritus Mario Molina, known for his research uncovering the impact of CFCs on the ozone layer. Harvey notes that Molina’s work, “will also help to avert ruin from that other dire emergency, the climate crisis.”

NBC News reporters Lindsay Hoffman and Caroline Kim spotlight graduate student Joy Buolamwini’s work uncovering racial and gender bias in AI systems in a piece highlighting women who are “shattering ceilings, making groundbreaking discoveries, and spreading public awareness during the global pandemic.” Hoffman and Kim note that Buolamwini’s research "helped persuade these companies to put a hold on facial recognition technology until federal regulations were passed.”

Third-year student Casey Johnson speaks with Washington Post reporter Luz Lazo about his work exploring the feasibility of using GPS technology to determine when a scooter is on the sidewalk. Lazo explains that Johnson wrote a “surface categorization algorithm to detect the periodic cracks in a sidewalk. He then added an accelerator sensor — which costs less than $1 — to detect when the scooter is being used on an asphalt road versus a concrete sidewalk.”

A new study by MIT researchers finds that Black Americans pay more than any other group to own a home, reports Anna Bahney for CNN. "The small differences compounding over the life of the mortgage and during home ownership can add up," explains Senior Lecturer Edward Golding. "Even if it is a few hundred dollars a year here and there, it can amount to another year's salary families would otherwise have."